So 1Q84. When I saw someone else reading this in a café in the South Bank somewhere, I had to fight the urge to go up and talk to them about it. I felt liked I'd seen a fellow traveller in a strange city and I wanted to know if they were enjoying it, if they were getting it, what they liked and hated. I did like it, because at times it built this world with two moons and religion and the Tokyo freeways into something very solid, then at other times it seemed to be driven by the intellect of murakami, and so I felt distanced from it. One occasion when the book did me feel a bit silly was when 500 pages or so in I realised it's Books 1 and 2 of a trilogy. so I've still not finished with these two worlds. Anyway, I'll come back to this when I read part 3. It's time better spent than reading about football I guess.

So far, it's the story of two people, Aomame and Tengo, and their movement back towards each other.  The chapters alternate between the two lovers, who come to be moving in parallel but connected worlds - 1984 and 1Q84. It seems a book that allows Murakami to revisit a lot of the things that he is interested in - physical endurance, cults, and the world changing power of love. Because it writes about writing and fiction I think Murakami himself is very present in the book, and whether the interesting things he has to say justifies the egotism in this approach is a bit of a moot point. In places the writing is strangely clichéd, and I found the lesbian sex and violence both a bit kind of... unrealised, or corny. Yet at times it was brilliant. so here I sit - torn. I don't recommend it, but I want to talk to people that have read it, because the frustrations and delights I met on the way gave me something I haven't experienced before.